Sometimes, just playing the games isn’t enough. Sometimes you want to have a little something extra to show off your love of a game. T-shirts are a good place to start (and you can find a few on the clothing page of this guide), but this page shows off some ideas for those who want to go a little further.

If you’ve got gamers in your life, here are a few collectibles that are sure to please.

Following up to its 2011 hit Bastion is Supergiant Games’ indie strategic action-RPG Transistor. Bastion had one of the best soundtracks off the year when it was released, and true to form, Transistor’s original soundtrack from composer Darren Korb is among the best this year. Available on both CD and as a digital download, Transistor features more than 60 minutes of original rockish, jazzy music from the game, plus an exclusive bonus track not featured in the game and an extended track featured in the game’s original reveal trailer. This one’s a must for the game music fan in your life, and anybody who enjoys a great soundtrack in general.

Dishonored: Dunwall Archives

Price: $40Buy It For: Lovers of game story, Dishonored fans, people who like to read game stuff without playing a gameBuy It From:The Bethesda StoreRecommended by: Phil Hornshaw

Arkane Studio’s Dishonored is a couple years old at this point, but the amount of lore packed into its game world remains pretty impressive even as we move full-force in the new generation of consoles and their accompanying titles. Dishonored: Dunwall Archives compiles all that in-game lore, spread through various books and documents scattered across Dishonored’s many missions, into one hard-bound limited edition volume. If there’s a game story fan in your life, you might consider snagging the Dunwall Archives to give them something extensive into which to delve. It’s also a great gift for the collector of obscure gaming items, since Bethesda is printing a mere 500 of these limited volumes.

After the successes of Skylanders and Disney Infinity, Nintendo saw fit to toss their own cap into the collectible/peripheral ring with the first set of Amiibo figurines. The first set includes 12 Nintendo mascot characters, including Mario, Peach, Link, Samus, Yoshi, Donkey Kong, Pikachu, Kirby, Fox, Marth, Villager and Wii Fit Trainer. In addition to simply looking like a great addition to any Nintendo fan’s desk of collectibles, these little figurines can also be used in conjunction with games like Mario Kart 8 and Smash Brothers, as well as the upcoming Mario Party 10, Captain Toad’s Treasure Tracker, and Yoshi’s Wooly World to unlock special features for those games. In Mario Kart 8′s case, placing an Amiibo on top of the Wii-U gamepad’s sensor will unlock a special costume of that character to be worn by your personal Mii. The big selling point is how the Amiibo’s are used in Smash Brothers Wii-U. Players can scan in their Amiibos and then play as or against them in the game. Amiibos will level up the more they are played with; learning from you and developing a fighting style similar to how you play. Amiibo figures will most likely be a big part of many big Wii-U titles going forward, and while collecting all 12 of the starting set may be a pricey endeavor, getting at least one or two will let you check out some neat features that are otherwise inaccessible.

This 11 oz. black coffee mug is emblazoned with the iconic image of Butt Stallion, Handsome Jack’s favorite pony. Borderlands fans can have their coffee while silently showing off their mastery of Borderlands 2.

You’ve gotta hand it to BioWare — they make some damn cool collectibles. One of the latest to come out of the wallet-murdering BioWare Store is a 19-inch statuette of Mass Effect character Tali. The highly detailed figurine of Mass Effect’s best character (yup, I said it) by artist Gurjeet Singh deserves a place of honor on a desk or shelf, and it’ll scratch your rare-stuff collector itch, too: BioWare’s limiting the run to only 1,000 units. The only bummer is that the Tali statue is currently out of stock, so if you mean to gift it to the ME lover in your life, they might have to wait a few — or several — months.

Bungie’s persistent-world space shooter Destiny does at least one thing very well: it awesomely conveys an epic sense of scale thanks to a vast, gorgeous soundtrack. Invoking the kind of Bungie sound that made the Halo soundtracks universally awesome, the Destiny soundtrack mixes sweeping orchestral marches with reverent, stirring vocal choruses. There’s a ton of music on this soundtrack — better than two hours’ worth — and even if you’re not in love with Destiny, it’s hard not to want to jack the volume on the themes for the game’s biggest fight scenes.

In creating Wolfenstein: The New Order and its alternate historical timeline, developer MachineGames and publisher Bethesda also created some brilliant pop culture tidbits to make the world feel real. The best is a series of 1960s pop songs that came out of the Nazi-dominated alt-history, recorded in German and which have been compiled on a two-sided special edition red vinyl record. Bethesda has only printed 500 of the individually numbered albums, so not only do you get a soundtrack from a 1960s that never existed, you also get a little bit of collectible cache to boot.

Note: If you follow the retail links in this post and make purchases on the site(s), Defy Media may receive a share of the proceeds from your sale through the retailer’s affiliate program.

We talk about the return of B.J. Blazkowicz in this week’s podcast, and how Wolfenstein: The New Order is a fun game that quite never reaches its potential. Once we’re wrung all we can out the Nazi threat, we move on to the Caribbean, where we tackle Tropico 5 and players’ return to the role of El Presidente, SuperGiant Games’ Transistor, and new Batman: Arkham Knight stuff.

Then it’s on to the real big news of the week: Zenimax’s lawsuit against Oculus VR. GameFront Editor-in-Chief Janelle Bonanno is not only a lawyer, she troubled to read the extensive complaint filed by Zenimax against Oculus, and runs down Zenimax’s case and the legal ins and outs for the rest of us.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/gf-podcast-28-wolfenstein-tropico-and-zenimaxs-lawsuit/feed/1Batman: Arkham Knight,Features,GameFront Podcast,Oculus VR,Transistor,Tropico 5,Wolfenstein: The New Order,Zenimax Online StudiosWe talk out this week's big releases, Wolfenstein: The New Order and Transistor, as well as explain the ins and outs of the ZeniMax/Oculus lawsuit.We talk out this week's big releases, Wolfenstein: The New Order and Transistor, as well as explain the ins and outs of the ZeniMax/Oculus lawsuit.Game Frontno59:57Transistor Review: Delayed Gratificationhttp://www.gamefront.com/transistor-review-delayed-gratification/
http://www.gamefront.com/transistor-review-delayed-gratification/#commentsTue, 20 May 2014 16:00:49 +0000Phil Hornshawhttp://www.gamefront.com/?p=273858

Supergiant Games’ Transistor has a lot in common with the studio’s first effort, Bastion — and it’s probably fair to say that if you like the former, you’ll have a pretty good time with the latter.

Bastion became one of those indie darlings, and Transistor carries many of the same elements and formulae that found their way into Supergiant’s first title. Transistor is a graphically gorgeous game, set in a strange world with a minimal narrative but plenty of narration. Where Bastion was a two-stick shooter, Transistor is an action-strategy game, but there are more similarities than differences. Transistor got all the high points of Bastion, but it got the low points, too.

Among those highs: tight battle mechanics and control scheme; a beautiful art style; a great soundtrack. And among the lows: a story that’s minimal to the point of being dull, and gameplay that takes a while to get its feet under it. Transistor gets strong over time, as narrative elements finally get uncovered and gameplay elements start to stack together, but it’s an uneven experience that’s prettier than it is satisfying.

Transistor gives you little inkling as to what’s going on as you stumble into its isometric city streets. You play Red, a woman who was formerly a singer, but whose voice has been stolen. This is not really an important story element except that it means Red is unable to speak for the duration.

Meanwhile, what can speak is the Transistor, a big green electronic sword that you discover within seconds of the start of the game. It’s buried in the chest of some poor fool, and you drag it out at the sword’s behest as it somewhat vaguely implies the dead guy’s spirit might be inside it. Once freed, the sword becomes a constant companion and defense against vicious enemies overtaking the city.

Dropping players in medias res into a story is not an uncommon approach for games, but Transistor throws out mysteries in all the wrong places. Turns out, that dude with the sword in him is pretty important and those opening seconds of the game were pretty dramatic — right before the player got there. Turns out, there’s a ton of backstory to Red, that guy, and the four conspiracy group members who attempted to kill her with the sword. But you won’t really get any of that context until much, much later in the game, and in the meantime, and the overarching question of “What’s up with these robots?” is a lot less enticing.

What you know right now is that you have the sword, and that there are robots you have to fight called The Process. These white mechanical creatures come in several varieties, mixing and matching in fights to create challenges through their combinations. Luckily, the Transistor is a powerful weapon that can stop time and let you execute strategy game-style orders in rapid succession.

The sword itself gathers up “functions,” which are various kinds of attacks, and you can execute them in real time or in “turn()” mode, which is where the strategy game elements come in. Real-time fighting is possible but is more of a last resort: The Process is faster and more effective than you are, generally, and Red often moves slow as she tries to drag or swing the heavy sword to release a short-range shockwave or fire bolts of energy. Instead, you can fire up a turn() and string multiple moves together, allowing you to strike at different enemies and even move Red out of harm’s way nearly instantly.

The simplest way to explain Supergiant Games’ Transistor is in terms of its last game, Bastion. It’s Bastion with strategy elements.

Bastion, for the uninitiated, is a top-down action-RPG title similar in presentation to games such as Diablo 2. It has players manning a number of different weapons as they worked through various levels in a strange country called Caelondia, where a cataclysmic event has killed just about everyone and rent the very land into floating pieces. A phenomenal soundtrack, hand-drawn art style and gravely voice-over narration brought extremely high production values to the game, and it was a generally a well-liked indie title that pushed the bounds of its genre.

Transistor, Supergiant Games’ next game coming more than two years later, is similar in a lot of ways. It has a fantastical setting, a similar hand-drawn look, and an emphasis on a single speaker as storyteller. It’s played from a top-down viewpoint as well, and makes use of action-RPG elements in its combat-heavy gameplay.

The major difference between Supergiant’s two titles, however, is the emphasis on strategy elements in Transistor. Players charge up a resource that allows them to briefly freeze time and execute a “turn” of attacks against enemies, who move slowly and can’t react during that period. Protagonist Red can move around the game space and rattle off a set number of moves during that time; some moves seem to expend more energy than others, shortening the number of attacks that can be strung together.

“A lot of people on the team are just sort of preoccupied with that kind of game. A lot of us on the team love tactical kind of games,” said Darren Korb, Supergiant’s audio director, explaining the genesis of Transistor’s strategic elements. “At the same time, we wanted to maintain some of the immediacy of the action-RPG thing and real-time combat. So we decided to try to kind of combine them in a way that would allow you to play as tactically as you wanted, basically. Because, for some people, that’s not their thing, but we wanted to give you options.”

The name “Transistor” actually refers to a sword with special powers. During a hands-on demo on the E3 2013 show floor, I got to play the early portion of Transistor, in which Red — formerly a popular singer in the game’s world — was attacked and suddenly found herself in a strange place, and apparently, without a voice. A moment later, she discovered a body run through with a huge sword: the Transistor. Things get a little stranger when the Transistor starts to talk to Red, giving her advice, convincing her to pick it up, and guiding her out of the area and through fights against “The Process,” which seems primarily to be made up of strange robots that look like cousins of the Aperture Science turrets from the Portal series.

Before she even knows what’s going on, Red finds herself embroiled in combat against various Process robots. Mostly, the robots are pretty dumb from an AI standpoint, and will largely just chase Red around each room. They become dangerous because, for one, Red isn’t very fast, and two, their numbers are often enough to crowd the area.

On the Playstation 4 build I played, Red’s attacks were mapped to the face buttons on the PS4 controller and came in a number of varieties. At first, only two were available: a line-based attack with a short range, and a larger, more powerful line attack that took longer to execute. You can use these moves in real time as you run around each battle, but you can also use the Transistor to execute a turn instead. The benefit of the tactical approach is that it gives you the ability to stack moves together and then get Red out of danger, and also provides you with more detailed information about things like line of sight: in essence, you can plan your attacks to do more damage as they hit more than one enemy.

The trade-off, however, is a short period of vulnerability following the turn in which Red can’t attack. So rather than constantly using turns, you can move Red’s attacks in real time, which can sometimes prove more effective (but also dangerous). As Korb said, players have options, and often the situation will dictate which approach is the better one.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/transistor-developer-supergiant-is-preoccupied-with-strategy-games/feed/0Transistor Will Contain Some Form of Multiplayerhttp://www.gamefront.com/transistor-will-contain-some-form-of-multiplayer/
http://www.gamefront.com/transistor-will-contain-some-form-of-multiplayer/#commentsTue, 02 Apr 2013 05:56:07 +0000Ian Miles Cheonghttp://www.gamefront.com/?p=215266

Supergiant Games has been working on Transistor since they released Bastion last a couple of years back. Bastion, their first game, received multiple “Game of the Year” awards for its story, soundtrack, and gameplay.

One of the things the original game lacked was a multiplayer mode, which will see implementation in Transistor, the game’s creative director Greg Kasavin revealed. Speaking to Rock Paper Shotgun, the developer says that any multiplayer they intend to implement will not be in the vein of a deathmatch arena.

“The combat maybe could work in multiplayer, but I don’t see this game having deathmatch arenas or whatever. I think I can say that pretty safely,” he said. “Something we’re more interested in is a sense of feeling connected to other people who are playing in a subtle way.

“You can still have your personal experience around the story, but you always know you belong in a larger [world],” he said. “For example, players can sometimes see traces of other players’ paths moving around. Things of that nature. What’s interesting to us about this world is that it lends itself to some interesting things like that.”

In other words, it might be something like Dark Souls’ ghosts.

Kasavin says that the studio experimented with co-op play in Bastion but ultimately cut it as it conflicted with the story.

“Traditionally, we agree that co-op is probably the most enjoyable way to play action-RPGs — with 1-3 other people. But we found it to be quite at odds with our narrative goals,” he said.

As for Transistor, “[co-op is] not in the cards for us right now. But again, the part where you don’t feel alone in the world is very important to us. Solitude can be a very powerful feeling in games, but we want to use it intentionally. We don’t just want it to be the default mode of being in the game. We’d rather play around with it and use it purposefully.”

Supergiant Games is best known for Bastion, a game which picked up multiple awards for its story, gameplay, and music. The title is most renown for its use of an active narrator, voiced by Logan Cunningham.

Today, the studio announced its next game. Titled Transistor, it looks a lot like Bastion and appears to be set in a cyberpunk futuristic setting in a city called Cloudbank. Watch the trailer below.

The upcoming Transistor is an action RPG which puts players in the role of a protagonist named Red. Like its spiritual predecessor, Transistor features an isometric top-down view and places a strong emphasis on fast-paced combat. And much like Bastion, a lot of work is being put into its soundtrack.

According to Supergiant, an early version of the game will be playable at PAX East later this week at their booth.

Transistor is set for a 2014 release. The platforms have yet to be announced.